Review of Our Kind of Traitor (2016) by Clarisesamuels — 23 Jul 2016

The spy genre continues to be one of the most popular Hollywood themes making the rounds in the theaters. This time we have an adaptation from the master himself, John le Carré, starring Ewan McGregor as a citizen spy who is reluctantly dragged into a Russian Mafia intrigue, and Naomie Harris, fresh from her role as Moneypenny in the last James Bond extravaganza. In this film Harris is no longer an unobtrusive sidekick for Bond’s sardonic and self-assured bravado. She is one of the two principals, and she plays an intelligent lawyer who is trying to heal her damaged marriage. Having her empathetic husband fall into the good graces of a Russian Mafia front man who is about to be fired from his job as chief accountant and then murdered along with his family, only serves to make her marital woes that much more complicated.

Gail (Naomie Harris) and Perry (Ewan McGregor) are trying to mend their marriage on a romantic holiday in Marrakesh, when Gail leaves Perry alone at a restaurant after dinner just two nights before they are due to fly back to London. Sitting by himself, he attracts the attention of a friendly but coarse and obnoxious Russian named Dima (Stellan Skarsgård). Dima invites Perry to his table, takes him to a party meant for decadent millionaires only, and then insists upon an early morning tennis match. Finally, after having bonded heavily with the mild-mannered professor of poetics, Dima tells Perry his dark secret. He is the chief accountant in charge of all the Swiss bank accounts for the Russian Mafia, now headed by a businessman/gangster called the Prince. Dima is in possession of incriminating knowledge; he knows that when he signs off on the accounts a few weeks hence, he and his family will be murdered, as was the previous accountant. He needs Perry to take back to London for him a memory stick of all the numbers and names on the Swiss bank accounts, which include top members of British Parliament. The British government is about to accept billions of dollars in funding from the Prince, who masquerades as a legitimate multibillionaire businessman. Dima needs to expose the scam and convince the British government to offer him and his family asylum in England. Perry agrees to be his messenger.

Thus begins a complicated and tense escapade, where Perry and Gail get more and more involved, along with the small number of British government officials who are willing to investigate the scandal and try to bring it down. This is not the kind of spy movie where there are multiple chase scenes in cars, speedboats, and planes. This is a more subtle kind of spycraft that involves a lot of talking, political negotiations, and patient waiting. As in real life, sometimes the action lags; nevertheless, the quiet, low-key kind of suspense generated by the plot is unrelenting from the first scene to the very end. McGregor has to carry what is occasionally a talking-heads plot for the entire film along with a lot of help from Harris, and the two of them make a good team. Skarsgård, who is actually Swedish, is brilliant in the role of Dima.